The Hy-Gain CLR-2 ground plane

[FPR1981]

I've seen this referred to as the little brother to the Penetrator. Whether it was brought to market that way, I cannot say. I spoke with a Penetrator restoration aficionado and he says that he has, on many occasions, modified the CLR-2 to become, in essence, a Super Penetrator. I've heard others say that this was a good antenna, but had something in the way of a small printed circuit board that would burn out, and that this was the weak link of this antenna.

Anyone ever own one and what was your experience?

 

[FPR1981]

Ooooh, lookie, here's someone with no concept of reality who wants $350 for one.

CB Base Antenna Vintage 1960’s Hy-Gain CLR2 NEW!

$350?! With better antennas out there for less than half of this? Yeah, right.

A "new" CLR-2 becomes a used CLR-2 like anything else when it's outside and exposed to the elements like any other antenna. And with the ability to smoke one so easily with extra power.

 

[eorange]

Are these antenna names for real? And people wonder why CB flamed out 😃

 

[W9WSS]

The Hy-Gain CLR-2 was a major competitor with the Antenna Specialists Super Magnum. I've had 'em all, but finally ended up with a Shakespeare Big Stick. I've known CB'ers who have had the good old Astro Plane and Astro beam, which are few and far between. Those were popular "back in the day" when I was much more active in CB radio. I am talking about the late 60s/early 70s. I surmise the entire market has changed.

I've spoken with a few active CB'ers recently, and they are huge fans of Zero-5 and the Maco antenna. Oh, and let's not forget about the Imax-2000 or Solarcon A99.

Whatever you decide to do, make sure you check, double-check, and triple-check your measurements before you get your antenna up in the air, whether it's on a tower, a telescopic mast, or brackets on your home.

 

[FPR1981]

Are these antenna names for real? And people wonder why CB flamed out 😃

It did, but it's making a resurgence as of late. Thank you for jumping in here. Pulling people down into the 11-meter gutter with me is fun, LOL.

The Hy-Gain CLR-2 was a major competitor with the Antenna Specialists Super Magnum. I've had 'em all, but finally ended up with a Shakespeare Big Stick. I've known CB'ers who have had the good old Astro Plane and Astro beam, which are few and far between. Those were popular "back in the day" when I was much more active in CB radio. I am talking about the late 60s/early 70s. I surmise the entire market has changed.

I've spoken with a few active CB'ers recently, and they are huge fans of Zero-5 and the Maco antenna. Oh, and let's not forget about the Imax-2000 or Solarcon A99.

Whatever you decide to do, make sure you check, double-check, and triple-check your measurements before you get your antenna up in the air, whether it's on a tower, a telescopic mast, or brackets on your home.

The new IMAX 2000 is a pile of dog poo, the A99 is just kind of meh and Maco is very popular and affordable. It's so cool to see so many hams coming down and playing in the 11-meter dirt. I KNOW damn well more than a few on here are walking down memory lane and have probably pulled out an old radio or two since I crashed the party here a couple months back and keep topics fresh, LOL.

 

[prcguy]

I've had a number of Hy-Gain CLR2s and also the Radio Shack version. I've also burned up a number of coils in the base. The CLR2 was otherwise a good antenna, worked a little better than a Big Stick and A/S half wave end feds and Stardusters. I currently have a very late model Radio Shack version I got NIB off Ebay in the $40 range. Its interesting that it has a hand wound coil in the base made from about 16ga black insulated wire to replace the circuit board. Long story on why I know this but I have a Diamond 6m colinear where I burned out a cap in the base and when the time came to drill it out and work on it I accidently grabbed the wrong base and drilled out the RS 5/8 wave.

 

[FPR1981]

I've had a number of Hy-Gain CLR2s and also the Radio Shack version. I've also burned up a number of coils in the base. The CLR2 was otherwise a good antenna, worked a little better than a Big Stick and A/S half wave end feds and Stardusters. I currently have a very late model Radio Shack version I got NIB off Ebay in the $40 range. Its interesting that it has a hand wound coil in the base made from about 16ga black insulated wire to replace the circuit board. Long story on why I know this but I have a Diamond 6m colinear where I burned out a cap in the base and when the time came to drill it out and work on it I accidently grabbed the wrong base and drilled out the RS 5/8 wave.

Can the CLR-2 be easily modified to fix the coil issue?

 

[prcguy]

Maybe and I might have done this in the 70s. The circuit board was really cheap off white material with a thin, bare copper spiral wound inductor that was tapped. You should be able to solder a continuous wire of maybe up to 14ga in the shape of the spiral onto the circuit board, beefing up the conductor size and power handling. The inductance will change some and it should go down slightly. You can simply make up for the main coil loading or shortening effects by lengthening the vertical portion of the antenna slightly. The tap portion of the coil for matching should not be super critical so I would think a good match will be obtained by just tuning the vertical section.

You would want to really clean all the solder flux off the board so everything is bright and shiny and I might give the board and bare copper wire a coat of clear Krylon after its proven to work and tune ok. I kind of remember the original circuit board working fine for people running upwards of 200 watts and above 300 watts was the range where boards would start to burn up. Most of my experience was with the Radio Shack version and I can't remember if the Hy-Gain was identical or similar.

Can the CLR-2 be easily modified to fix the coil issue?

 

[FPR1981]

Maybe and I might have done this in the 70s. The circuit board was really cheap off white material with a thin, bare copper spiral wound inductor that was tapped. You should be able to solder a continuous wire of maybe up to 14ga in the shape of the spiral onto the circuit board, beefing up the conductor size and power handling. The inductance will change some and it should go down slightly. You can simply make up for the main coil loading or shortening effects by lengthening the vertical portion of the antenna slightly. The tap portion of the coil for matching should not be super critical so I would think a good match will be obtained by just tuning the vertical section.

You would want to really clean all the solder flux off the board so everything is bright and shiny and I might give the board and bare copper wire a coat of clear Krylon after its proven to work and tune ok. I kind of remember the original circuit board working fine for people running upwards of 200 watts and above 300 watts was the range where boards would start to burn up. Most of my experience was with the Radio Shack version and I can't remember if the Hy-Gain was identical or similar.

I have also heard that water infiltration was an issue with these antennas. Seems like the clear Krylon might be a good measure against this.